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HIGHLIGHTS ACADEMIC INSERT AUTUMN TERM 2009

School Sponsored Walk 10th July 2009

EDUCATION

THE

MOST IMPORTANT GIFT

The Chairman of Governors’ Prizegiving Address Distinguished guest, ladies and gentlemen I am never quite sure about ‘mission and students. Welcome to St Albans statements’ but ‘to provide an excellent School Annual Prize Giving. education whereby pupils can achieve the highest standard of academic sucWhenever a large number of people cess according to ability and develop come together in one place, issues of their character and personality so as to health and safety come into play. In case become caring and self-disciplined adults’ of an emergency, the exit doors are situ- will do for me. ated to the side, to the rear and to the front. There are ﬂotation devices under In terms of academic success, this year’s the pews and in the unlikely event of a results are nothing short of fantastic. I do sudden loss of pressure, oxygen masks not intend to dwell on the detail which are probably not going to reach us from can be found in the Headmaster’s letter to all parents at the start of term and this ceiling. also on the School’s website. After a few words from me, I will be introducing the Headmaster and then They are a credit to the students, their our distinguished guest of honour parents/guardians and, of course, to Charles Crawford CMG, OA who will the skill and dedication of the teaching present the prizes and conclude tonight’s staff. To all of you, I offer my warmest congratulations. event with his personal address. The purpose of this evening is to present prizes to those judged worthy to receive them. I want to say to those not receiving prizes that you are equally valued and valuable.You will have contributed to the health and welfare of the School and you are in no way diminished by the lack of goodie bag from tonight’s event.

The report of the recent inspection of the School said that:-

I speak on behalf of the Governors and I want to say a word about them. They are truly a dedicated bunch of talented people.They give their time and wisdom to the School and you have rewarded their efforts by producing a stunning set of exam results.

I am as interested in producing wellrounded individuals equipped to face adult challenges as I am in them achieving high academic standards.

As Governors, we are re-examining our governance structure. We have to keep pace with the constant changes in education and society. We are proposing to streamline our approach to meet the challenges we face from political antipathy and the increasing burden of regulatory interference. I want at this stage to pay special tribute to my predecessor, recent generous benefactor and long time friend of the School, Mr Ian Jennings. The state of the School today coupled with this year’s excellent exam results are ﬁtting testaments to his dedication.Tonight provides another opportunity to show our appreciation of all that he has done for the School by this round of applause.

‘The School provides an outstanding educational experience which is successful in promoting pupils linguistic, mathematical, scientific, human, social and physical development’.

New Chairman of Governors Stephen Eames

I am as interested in producing well-rounded individuals equipped to face adult challenges as I am in them achieving high academic standards. According to the inspection the school seems to have got most things just about right. It was a year ago yesterday that Lehmann Brothers collapsed, precipitating a signiﬁcant economic downturn, job loss and uncertainty. Between then and now, we have witnessed the naming, shaming and nest-feathering of our politicians. Perhaps all of those responsible for this unseemly lack of integrity (driven by greed, avarice and bloated bonuses) would do well to follow the School’s motto. It is time for honesty, integrity and trust to be restored and rewarded. I am pleased to note that the School has this on its agenda.

We are in turbulent economic times. The education we provide our children is probably the most important gift we can bestow upon them. For its part, the School will continue to provide an excellent product at as reasonable a price as possible. I would also like to thank the non-teaching staff for their considerable contribution to the success of the School. I would also like to mention the importance of the Development Office under the guidance of Kate Le Sueur.The School is not richly endowed but is keen to provide top quality facilities and meet its public benefit obligations by the provision of bursaries. The Governors see this as a very significant aspect of the School’s future. Finally, we would not be where we are today were it not for the inspired leadership of our Headmaster Andrew Grant. In charge since 1993, his contribution to education has been recognised by his appointment as Chairman of the HMC. The School, under his stewardship, has grown in strength and reputation and I would invite you to show your appreciation for all that he has achieved as I invite him to speak.

OUTSTANDING SUCCESSES The Headmaster’s Prizegiving Address Chairman, Guest of Honour, Ladies and academic year and we begin the new one Gentlemen, welcome to the Abbey and with the School Roll at an all-time high. to our 2009 Prizegiving. Even before we get on to examination It was on such an occasion and in results, we can point to exceptional such a place as this that an angel once extra-curricular success: the First XV appeared to a Headmaster and told him were declared Evening Standard Team that, in recognition of his selfless, tireless of the Month in November and suffered and exemplary behaviour, he would only one defeat, by one point, in a long be rewarded with his choice of either season’s campaign. They, and the majorbeauty or wealth or infinite wisdom. ity of our teams, finished well up in the Andrew Grant, Without hesitation, the Headmaster season-long leagues run by the SchoolHeadmaster selected infinite wisdom. Instantly, the srugby web site.The undefeated summer angel disappeared in a flash, leaving a faint tour of New Zealand, Fiji and the Cook odour of sanctity and the Headmaster Islands was a fitting end to their School surrounded by a shimmering aura of Rugby careers for a number of our stars. light. There was silence. The audience The U12 team defeated twenty other were aware that something strange had schools from around Hertfordshire in occurred, but were not sure what. After an embarrassing pause, the Chairman it was right and proper… that we received multiple of Governors tapped the Headmaster verdicts of ‘outstanding’ in the inspection that took on the shoulder and whispered: ‘Say place earlier this year. something!’ Summoning and sifting the knowledge of all the ages past and ages yet to come to which he now had complete and instant access, the Headmaster slowly surveyed his audience and his gaze was steady and sad and pitying and infinitely weary. At last, with a sigh, he moved to the microphone, and delivered himself of this truth: ‘I should have taken the money.’

the Herts 10’s Rugby Tournament and took the honours in the ﬁnal from the hosts, Berkhamsted, while in hockey the U13s took second place in the county in the National Minis Cup County Tournament.

The girls, too, had a successful netball season, beating the High School in the District competition and Loreto in an We haven’t given our prize winners inter-school ﬁxture, which are always quite the same range of options, but satisfying results. let me begin by congratulating them all very warmly. For reasons I will come to The cross-country squad had to settle later, we have an unusually large number for being merely the third best in the tonight, you will have a lot of applauding country this year, bringing the bronze to do and will have sore hands by the medals back from the King Henry VIII end of the evening, but let me include relay title they were defending in Covin those congratulations my colleagues entry and our senior swimmers were who have worked so hard to help them winners of the County league. achieve that success and the parents who have obviously started by bequeathing Our cricketers surpassed all recent seatheir children excellent DNA and gone sons, with a clean sweep in all District on supporting them in their efforts. Championships, the U13 County Cup and an 82% win rate for the First XI But this is an evening for celebrating who retained the Bedford Twenty/20 excellence and achievement and our shield and topped the Schoolscricket successes this year are not represented league table. Our number one Men’s solely by those young people here pair retained the U18 County Tennis tonight. If any occasion is one for exercisChampionship and several longstanding ing unashamed bragging rights, this is it. athletics records fell on Sports Day.

For a year in which the press was gleefully predicting the imminent implosion of the independent sector, courtesy of the deepest recession in living memory, we have had a remarkably successful past

The Joint Schools oratorio in the Abbey was a triumphant performance of Karl Jenkins’s The Armed Man – A Mass for Peace and then, over Easter, our musicians went off to Italy to give three

very well received concerts: at Olivo Camaiore, in Pistoia Cathedral and at San Gimignano. Tom Blackie will be the seventh Choral Scholar we have sent to Cambridge in six years and this summer, one of our Fifth Formers, Freddie Sawyer, has been playing the title role in an adult production of Hamlet in our own open air theatre. Our CCF has undergone a prestigious re-affiliation to the Coldstream Guards and nine of our cadets attended leadership courses at the National Cadet Leadership Training Centre at Frimley Park, one of them, Gareth Gibson, being named best cadet of the course. It doesn’t stop when they leave: this year, an OA won the Sword of Honour at Sandhurst; there were OA athletics and cross-country Blues won at Cambridge, Friendly Fires – all recent OAs - are one of the hottest tickets in town, even if they were beaten to the Mercury Music Award last week and the list of First Class honours and higher degrees earned by OAs this year is the longest I can remember. All this being the case, it was right and proper, but very pleasing nonetheless, because what is right and proper doesn’t always happen, that we received multiple verdicts of ‘outstanding’ in the inspection that took place earlier this year. What was particularly gratifying was to see the quality of my colleagues’ pastoral work recognised formally, the accolades for the Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural dimensions of life at St Albans School and the fact that our links with the community were also judged outstanding – an important factor bearing in mind the interest the Charity Commission is taking in the Public Benefit provided by independent schools. That saga grinds on, and I spoke enough about it on this occasion last year, so I won’t repeat myself, but it is worth noting that the two HMC schools so far inspected have been declared to be operating for the public benefit. I’ve mentioned Sandhurst already, and if you look at the Passing-Out lists it’s fair to say that without HMC schools, this country’s armed forces would not have many officers.

The Commission, nevertheless, remains very resistant to the proposition that the £3 Billion, or so, that you, the parents, save the Exchequer by educating your children at your own, rather than the taxpayer‘s expense, amounts to a clear and widespread public benefit. I’d have thought it was quite a handy sum to find down the back of the DCSF sofa, so to speak; small change in these days of massive public borrowing, I know, but still enough, for example, to compensate those lowest earners who lost out from the Government’s abolition of the 10% tax band, if you can remember that far back. That being so, I am sure I was not the only one to appreciate the irony of hearing Dame Suzi Leather, interviewed on the Today programme on July 14 dismissing this notion in the very same week that the Government was compelled to announce – and I quote: ‘an extra £200m to provide new primary school places in parts of England struggling with shortages, [due in part to] the recession reducing numbers in private education’. She claimed the argument was like driving a private car and claiming charitable benefit for not using public transport, a simile which a number of entirely forgettable Government ministers obviously rather liked and subsequently parroted. It has obviously escaped Dame Suzi’s attention that Public Transport in this country is almost entirely privately owned but still heavily subsidised by the taxpayer, whilst independent school parents are in the position of someone who owns a top-of- the-range car, but is compelled to buy a full-price rail ticket every time they want to drive it. In any case, we

records at both GCSE and A level that place us in the very front rank of schools… believe the Commission’s interpretation of the law is fundamentally ﬂawed and if it comes to it, will take whatever action is necessary to test it. In October, at HMC Conference, I shall have the opportunity of pointing this, and a number of other things, out publicly to the Charity Commission and the press. And so to our examination results: records at both GCSE and A level that place us in the very front rank of schools in this country and on which our students and staff deserve the warmest congratulations. Unfortunately, the

annual publication of results is always a cue for a festival of hand-wringing, breast-beating, finger-pointing and navelgazing about whether or not standards are declining. In case this is a concern to you, I shall quote what I wrote in a recently-published article. Apparently other Heads have been copying it and sending it out to their parents, so perhaps you ought to hear it. Setting aside the question of what the critics would actually prefer (What conclusion would they draw from steadily declining pass rates? You can bet it would not be that exams were getting tougher; it would be that standards of teaching or students’ intelligence were declining) on the face of it, the evidence looks pretty damning: nationally, pass rates are approaching 100%; A grades account for more than a quarter of all results and the rise has been inexorable for the last 27 years, but it was the introduction of Curriculum 2000, when A levels went modular, that saw the beginning of the real acceleration in the top grades. When you take into account the effects of that one change, the true surprise is that it’s taking so long for the pass rate to reach 100%. Throughout their two-year course, module results provide A level students with accurate feedback on their progress and likelihood of success while the modular system allows them to abort the course at any point without ‘certificating’ or recording a result. In the circumstances, it could be argued that it requires heroic determination – or epic stupidity – to persevere with a course in which all your intermediate results have assured you of the inevitability of failure. The AS results, taken at the end of the first year, provide some indication of the scale of this sifting effect. There, the national pass rate is around 85%, much closer to the pass rates the carping critics would like to see, and even then, a great many AS results are never certificated, so a great deal of bad news simply vanishes as though it had never been. That goes a long way towards narrowing the gap between the pass rates of 27 years ago and those of today. But what about the rise in the top grades? Surely that can only be accounted for by less challenging exams? At this point I would normally trot out the argument

that the steady improvement in athletics records has not led us to suspect that tracks have been shortened, but, reeling from the advent of Usain Bolt, that might point to a conclusion that today’s A level students are all once-in-a-lifetime freaks of nature, so I’ll try a different simile.

The answer must be for selector universities to follow the lead of Cambridge and Imperial in making use of the new A* grade at the earliest possible opportunity, resisting the pressure from Government to delay. The pressure is politically-motivated; as the admirable Dr Cresswell has pointed out, statistically, it is almost certain that the highest proportion of A* grades will go to students educated in the independent sector.This will be politically embarrassing and starkly expose the degree to which the Government is putting pressure on universities to socially-engineer their intake according to criteria other than proven academic ability. For tunately, most universities value their academic freedoms enough to resist.

Imagine you have a hundredweight (50 kg) sack of coal to carry up a flight of stairs. You might struggle to do it in one lift, but if you made ten trips with five kilograms of coal in a bucket you would succeed and the desired outcome would be identical.The coal would be no less in quantity or quality and would be in the place you wanted it to be: at the top of the stairs. That, essentially, is the difference between a terminal and a modular examination system. The standard may remain the same, but the method of You could hardly make it up: universities examining makes it possible for more complain that reforms to A level have deprived them of the means of discrimipeople to reach it. nating between the best candidates, and Add to this the much greater transpar- ask for a new tool to help them do so. ency about mark schemes; the INSET The Government tasks the Awarding on examination technique provided by Bodies with providing such a tool and Awarding Bodies themselves; the right they come up with one that looks as to see photocopies of marked scripts though it will meet their requirements. and challenge results; the de-mystifica- The Government then warns universition of the whole process compared ties not to use it in case it does exactly with the arcane, inscrutable and deeply what it says on the tin and interferes inconsistent rituals of the supposed with their Widening-Access agenda.The golden age of examining and, above all, more pusillanimous universities, afraid perhaps, the opportunity for candidates of offending their paymasters, do as to re-take modules in which they have they’re told. underperformed and there isn’t really much more needed to account for the But there is not, and never has been, any conspiracy of the sort the Prime Minister relentless rise in grades. claimed in his ignorant comments of ten As Mike Cresswell, the Chief Executive years ago in what became universally of AQA, has noted, if A levels really were known as the Laura Spence Affair. The being dumbed-down, you would expect problem is a lack of aspiration. to see a uniform improvement in all parts of the system, yet, as Dr Cresswell again As the Sutton Trust has belatedly realised, notes, there are variations by region and universities can’t offer places to people by sector. Among the latter, the increase who don’t apply, nor to candidates of 2.1% in the proportion (now over who have done the wrong subjects at 50%) of A grades scored by the inde- A level and Alan Milburn in his report pendent sector, if translated into world on social mobility has come to a similar hundred-metre record-beating terms, conclusion. would leave even Usain Bolt looking It is a further chapter in the saga of flat footed. unintended consequences in which eduHowever, to be able to prove that the cation policy appears to specialise and problem of grade inflation is not due to which has culminated in ‘The Summer lowered standards, but has rational and of the Great Betrayal’. predictable causes is not the same thing as solving it, and it is a problem that is This country enjoys a real public benefit driving Admissions Tutors at the most in having highly-educated young people selective universities to ever more rec- qualifying from schools like this to go to ondite ways of differentiating between first-class universities to study subjects that are crucial to the social and ecoperfectly-qualified candidates. nomic well-being of the country and

for which there is certainly not a queue of disappointed applicants from state sector schools, but this summer has seen extraordinary pressure on university places, the legacy of incoherent Government policy and a lack of joined-up thinking over the past ten years. The story runs thus: In 2000, A levels are reformed to make them more accessible. In 2002 the failure to pilot the A2 exam properly results in the prospect of an unprecedented improvement in grades. Awarding Bodies come under pressure to rig the results and the fiasco is exposed by Heads’ associations, chiefly HMC, resulting in ministerial resignations. More young people get the higher grades that will qualify them for university. Meanwhile, the Government publishes a target of 50% of young people to be in Higher Education, but without a commensurate guarantee of increased funding. Simultaneously, the introduction of tuition fees is justified by rhetoric about the lifetimeearnings premium achieved by graduates, based on partial evidence and the status quo ante when graduates had a degree of rarity value in the job market. Young people buy into the Government’s rhetoric without realising that though all degrees are supposed to be equal, some are manifestly more equal than others, and not every degree from every Higher-Education Institution is a golden road to guaranteed riches. Meanwhile, they accrue end-of-course debts now estimated at £23,000. Summer 2009 delivers these graduates into the middle of a recession and a dearth of graduatelevel – indeed any level – employment opportunities. In the same year, the latest and largest generation of school leavers to believe the Government’s promises, applies to university only to find that the cashstrapped Government has capped the number of places available, threatened universities with financial penalties for exceeding their recruitment targets and put an artificial ceiling on the number of places available for home students. And then, last week, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) reported that in the UK, only 39 per cent of school leavers went on to gain a degree in 2007, placing the UK 11th out 26 developed nations. Numbers have barely increased since

2000 when the UK was joint third in the rankings. Nice work Gordon. That our own candidates have been, and almost always are, so successful in securing places, even if, on occasion, they dip below their conditional offer, is a tribute to the excellence of the advice on appropriate subjects and courses available at schools such as this and all too rare in other sectors.This ﬁnal stage in the experience of an education at St Albans School is down to the collective skills and experience of our sixth form team and I want to close today by paying tribute to a colleague who has done more than anyone else to build that expertise; Phil Talbot, who retired at the end of last academic year, after 28 years at the School, and an immensely distinguished 22-year career in charge of university applications and Sixth Form guidance during which more than 3,000 Sixth Form leavers have cause to be grateful for his advice and guidance. On this day for celebrating achievement, to him, and indeed to all my colleagues, teaching and non-teaching, I offer thanks on my own behalf and on yours.

Abbey Gateway, St Albans, Hertfordshire AL3 4HB Telephone: 01727 855521 Fax: 01727 843447 www.st-albans.herts.sch.uk At St Albans School, all Upper Sixth Pupils have taken at least three A levels and one AS level. Some of these pupils have also taken A and AS levels in the Lower Sixth. All Lower Sixth students are expected to study four subjects at AS level, with at least three being continued to A2 level in the Upper Sixth. In addition, all Sixth Formers take an AS General Studies course. All pupils take Mathematics GCSE in the Fourth Form. Most other GCSE subjects are taken in the Fifth Form. Although we are proud of the examination successes of our pupils, we believe that examination statistics are only one criterion of educational success. We therefore advise that they be interpreted with caution.

SUMMARY OF STATISTICS RESULTS IN PUBLIC EXAMINATIONS 5TH FORM - GCSE

2007

2008

2009

137

115

Percentage grades A* – C

100

Percentage grades A* and A

Percentage of candidates gaining grades A* – C in at least 5 subjects

100

Percentage of candidates gaining A* – C in English

100

Percentage of candidates gaining A* – C in Mathematics

100

Candidature

105

114

126

Percentage pass rate

100

Average UCAS points per entry, including AS

109.5

107.9

110.9

Average UCAS points per candidate, including AS

439.5

427.0

452.9

Candidature

U6 - A LEVEL

Percentage of grades A and B at A level

All examination results are provisional, depending on inquiries on results and remarks.

RESULTS IN PUBLIC EXAMINATIONS

ST ALBANS SCHOOL

Ancient History

Cumulative %

Art

Cumulative %

Biology

Cumulative %

Chemistry

Cumulative %

Drama

Cumulative %

DT Pr Des Gr

Cumulative %

DT Pr Des RM

Cumulative %

Economics

Cumulative %

English Literature

Cumulative %

French

Cumulative %

General Studies

Cumulative %

Geography

Cumulative %

100

GIRLSâ€™ A LEVEL RESULTS

Subject

84.6

100

% A-B

100

% Pass

100

Total

100 270 64.7

Cumulative % Totals Cumulative %

468.1

Cumulative % Spanish

Cumulative %

Physics

100

P.E. Cumulative %

Cumulative %

Music

Cumulative %

Cumulative % Further Maths

100

Mathematics

Cumulative %

Latin

History Cumulative %

Cumulative %

Greek (Classical)

Cumulative %

Cumulative % Govt & Politics

German

Subject

UCAS ave.

113.5

104.6

101.7

112.2

115.0

104.4

105.0

111.4

107.3

106.2

91.7

114.4

UCAS ave

90.9

109

100

98.8

100

100.0

100

100.0

100

100.0

100

417

Total

110.9

120.0

110.5

110.3

120.0

115.0

111.8

120.0

114.5

100.0

113.9

105.0

UCAS ave

U6 A LEVEL RESULTS

L6 AS LEVEL RESULTS Subject

Total

UCAS ave

Ancient History

51.9

44.7

48.8

47.3

44.2

60.0

55.5

44.3

52.9

50.0

54.4

57.5

53.0

60.0

54.4

60.0

53.8

59.5

44.3

55.4

53.5

50.8

54.0

578

51.5

Cumulative %

100

Art

Cumulative %

100

Biology

Cumulative %

100

Chemistry

Cumulative %

100

Drama

Cumulative %

100

DT Pr Des Graphics

Cumulative %

100

DT Pr Des Res Mats

Cumulative %

100

Economics

Cumulative %

100

English Literature

Cumulative %

100

French

Cumulative %

100

Geography

Cumulative %

100

German

Cumulative %

100

Govt. & Politics

Cumulative %

100

Greek

Cumulative %

100

History

Cumulative %

100

Latin

Cumulative %

100

Mathematics

Cumulative %

100

Further Maths

Cumulative %

100

Music

Cumulative %

100

Cumulative %

100

Physics

Cumulative %

100

Cumulative %

100

Spanish

Cumulative %

100

Totals

287

160

Cumulative %

49.7

77.3

91.7

97.2

99.3

100.0

100

Biology

Cumulative %

Business Studies

Cumulative %

Chemistry

Cumulative %

Drama

Cumulative %

DT Electronics

Cumulative %

English

Cumulative %

English Literature*

Cumulative %

French

Cumulative %

Geography

Cumulative %

100

Subject

French

Cumulative %

Mathematics

Cumulative %

Add. Mathematics

Cumulative %

4TH FORM

100

Dutch

Cumulative %

* IGCSE

DT Resistant Mats

Cumulative %

100

DT Graphics

Cumulative %

100

123

100

Total % A-C

115

Total % A-C

Cumulative %

Totals

Cumulative %

Religious Studies

Cumulative %

Greek (Modern)

Subject

Cumulative %

Totals

Cumulative %

Spanish

Cumulative %

60.6

137

100

645

100

Cumulative %

Physics

3 50

Cumulative %

5 36

Cumulative %

Music

Add Mathematics Cumulative %

Cumulative %

Mathematics

Cumulative %

Latin

Cumulative %

IT (half GCSE)

Cumulative %

History

Cumulative %

Greek (Classical)

Cumulative %

German

Subject

100

88.1

449

100

5.5

100

99.1

100

98.1

123

100

139

100

Total % A-C

1241

115

9.5

Total % A-C

AND

100

Cumulative %

Art

Subject

5TH 4TH FORM GCSE RESULTS

ACADEMIC MATTERS: COMMENTARY ON EXAMINATION RESULTS A LEVELS The percentage of A and B grades this year was 91.1 and the average number of A-level passes was 4.1. Using the UCAS tariff, where A=120, B=100 and so on, the average UCAS points score per pupil for A and AS levels was 452.9.This is the points equivalent of more than three A grades at A level, plus an A at AS. The average A level score per entry was 111, closer to an A than a B. 57 students, or more than 45% of the year group, achieved three or more A grades at A level. Of these, 26 achieved grade A in at least four A-levels or the equivalent, and, cumulatively, 47 scored grade A in three and a half A-levels (three full A levels plus one AS) or more, which qualiﬁes them for a Governors’ Award. All of these are records. It is not possible to list all Governors’ Award winners here, but the most notable individual performances were recorded by: Tom Blackie: 3 As at A level and one at AS, and a choral scholarship to St John’s College, Cambridge; Oliver Bond: 4 A grades plus a Distinction in English AEA and Merits in Latin and French; Alys Drake: 4 A grades at A level, two at AS and an AEA Merit in Geography; Mark Edwardes Jones: 4 As at A level, 2 at AS and AEA Distinctions in English and Geography; Krishan Kanzaria: 4 As at A level and 1 at AS; Christopher Larkin: 4 A grades and a B at A level, plus an A at AS; James Leather: 4 As at A level and 2 at AS; Richard Leather: 4 As at A level and 2 at AS; Matthew McGhee: 4 A grades at A level, 2 at AS and a Distinction in AEA Geography; David McLeod: 4 As at A level, 2 at AS and ‘S’ in STEP papers 2 and 3; Nick Rawlins: 4 As at A level and 2 at AS; Nathaniel Samson: 4 As at A level, 1 at AS and a Distinction in AEA English; Alastair Smout: 4 As at A level and 2 at AS; Angus Williams: 4 As at A level, and an A and a B at AS; Cheng Zhang: 4 As at A level, 2 at AS a Distinction in History AEA and a Merit in Biology AEA. In many cases, the above also achieved other grades in additional examinations.

GCSE 52% of all entries were graded A* and 88% graded A* or A. The average score per entry is signiﬁcantly higher than an A grade. All of these are records. The overall pass rate at grades A*-C was 100%. 100% of pupils achieved 5 or more grades A*- C including Maths, English and Science. 59 boys – more than half the year group - achieved A* or A throughout all their exams and 16 pupils achieved more than 10 A* grades. William Lay was the absolute top performer, with 11.5 GCSEs at A* , whilst Manhar Bhojwani, Elliot Fellowes, Geraint Northwood-Smith and Joseph Temple all achieved 11 GCSEs at A* and nothing lower. In total, 54 boys received Governors’ Awards for achieving at least six A* grades and nothing below an A grade in their best 8 subjects throughout their Fourth and Fifth Form GCSE examinations. 100% of Fourth Form students obtained grades A* to C in Mathematics. Grades A* and A were achieved by 90% of these students, with a record 59% achieving A*.

AFTER ST ALBANS At the time of writing, we have received news of the following outstanding achievements by Old Albanians at university this year: Ben Davies (1978) has been awarded his PhD in Music from the University of Southampton. Matthew Grant (2005) has been awarded a First in his MSc in Astrophysics and has been elected to a Bachelor Scholarship at Queens’ College, Cambridge. He will be remaining at Queens’ to study for a PhD in Physics. Saajan Chana (2004) has been awarded First Class honours in Part II of the Engineering Tripos at Queens’ College, Cambridge and a Merit in his M.Eng. Benedict Crampton (2005) has been awarded a Distinction in Part III Maths at Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge. Pierre Hyde (2006) has been awarded starred First Class Honours in Geography from Christ’s College, Cambridge. Matthew McLeod (2006) has been awarded First Class honours in Part II of the Natural Sciences Tripos at Queens’ College, Cambridge. Ben Williams (2006) has been awarded First Class Honours in Biological Sciences at Wadham College, Oxford and has accepted a place at St Catharine’s College, Cambridge to study for a PhD in Plant Sciences. Ed Pisano (2005) has been awarded First Class Honours in Mathematics at University College, Oxford. Alex Pedder (2006) has been awarded First Class Honours in English from Nottingham. At the same university, Anita Beveridge (2006) and Dan Grimwood (2006) have been awarded Firsts in History; David Weston (2006) has been awarded a First in Neuroscience; George Bragg (2006) has been awarded a First in Philosophy, and Georgia Martin (2006) a First in Psychology. Anthony Williams (2005) has been awarded First Class Honours in English from Royal Holloway. Rosa Kaban (2006) has been awarded First Class Honours in Mathematics from Durham University. Jack Harding (2006) has been awarded First Class Honours in Comparative Religion and Social Anthropology from Manchester. James Kerr (2006) has been awarded First Class Honours in History from Durham. Austin Dekker (2002), Chris Kelly (2002) and Michael Rafﬂes (2003) have qualiﬁed as doctors of medicine. Todd Davidson (2008) has achieved a First in Part I of the Engineering Tripos at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. Luke Howard (2007) has achieved a First in Part I Geography at Magdalen College, Cambridge.

Lt Col HWR Eagan chats to cadets at the CCF AGI 1st May 2009